Outdoor Voices: Tyler Haney

I created a list of twenty five. PCs. And I started emailing um I would say probably nineteen got back to me. And out of those nineteen, when you start to go meet with them, did any of them say, This is awesome, I'm in?

Oh no, every single one of those first meetings were like Love that you had the courage to get in here, but This needs work. From NPR, it's how I built this. about innovators, entrepreneurs, idealists, and the stories behind the movements.

They go. Guy Roz, and on today's show, how a former high school track star took inspiration from a casual jog. Built outdoor voices. A brand of athletic wear for people who aren't necessarily Athletes.

So think for a moment about energy bars. When Gary Erickson introduced cliff bars to the world in the early 1990s, Energy bars weren't as common as they are today. Even in the early two thousands, when Lara American launched Lara Bars? There was plenty of room to stand out. But by the time Peter Rahall debuted R X bars in two thousand thirteen.

There were literally hundreds of different energy bars to choose from. and trying to differentiate his bar from the thousands of other brand out there would require a different approach. So Peter focused, at least initially, on the CrossFit community, a relatively niche audience. It was a side door entry into what appeared to be an impenetrable category. But it worked, and eventually, those loyal CrossFitters helped turn RX bars into a major energy bar brand. This is more or less the playbook that Tyler Haney used to launch outdoor voices. By the time she decided to debut her athletic apparel brand in 2013, lots of people were telling her that the market

Was saturated. There was Lululemon and Athleta, in addition to the major sports brands like Adidas and Under Armour and Nike, and they were all dominating the so-called athleisure market. But Tyler saw a gap in that market she thought she could fill. You see, many of the big players were focused on performance athletics. The branding seemed to be for people who wanted to get faster and stronger and work out harder, but Tyler thought there were lots of people who didn't want to do those things. People who just wanted to get out and enjoy the fresh air. So she decided to build outdoor voices as an athletic clothing brand for everyone else.

But surprisingly, for someone who wanted to build a brand for non-athletes, Tyler Haney was, at one time, actually a super athlete. In Boulder, Colorado, where Tyler grew up, she was a standout track star who was targeted by college recruiters. But as a high school student, Tyler knew two things. She did not want to become an athlete and she Definitely didn't want to go into apparel. In fact, her mom and dad ran a small clothing company, and that business did not sound interesting to her.

I never wanted to be in apparel or fashion, but I was obsessed with the creativity of it. I definitely Loved and was obsessed with Seeing people start things. Yeah. And start things from scratch. And so that builder mentality.

I've always been a very creative Design inclined. person um and so I realized I really wanted to be in New York. Um that was the place to be, that was where Everything was happening and so

Started working on a portfolio to apply to Parsons School of Design. So you get to New York And you start Start your degree there. Um

And Where did your your mind take you? Where did you start to think? All right, this is what I could do when I'm done. Yeah, I I had no idea what I wanted to do until probably the third year in Parsons, so What instead I did was

Find a bunch of different jobs. while I was in school to kinda test and learn. So In my sophomore year I went to a company called Launch Collective. They were an incubator for startups and startups in the fashion and kind of design space.

And so I got to kind of run through working with different companies at very different stages. And experienced a lot kind of Simultaneously going to school at Parsons. How did you

Start to think about Maybe actually doing apparel, maybe actually Trying this out. What what happened? So throughout my four years at Parsons, um I had lost the Any sort of

commitment to activity, which was Which was kind of wild given I'd grown up in a in a place like bolder and obsessed with sports and and many sports. But I recognized that without

Teammates or coaches or practice or games to stay active, I had completely stopped. So so what happened like Was there just a a moment or a day where you were like all right, I gotta go for a run. I gotta just like I'm I'm really not feeling Right, I I'm off. Yeah, it was in my senior year and I I kind of remembered, okay, exercises in the past has helped me be more clear, I feel. Far from clear. Let's try this. So

Pulled out my my running gear. It was Nike at the time, a top and bottom. I think it was like bright purple and black and very shiny. Put that suit on and went jogging for the first time in Three to four years. On the West Side Highway.

And I was out there not even a mile, I think point eight miles at a very recreational pace and realized I have not moved my body, I've not exercised in such a long time. This this is a wake up call. This is wild. And when you got home when you got your door I'm like Were you like, Okay, I've gotta get back on track here. Or were you just sort of crushed here? This is not maybe this isn't This isn't for me.

Just simply through A bit of sweat. Felt like I found myself again. And so after that that small run, I wanted more of that feeling again. And movement became something that I craved on a daily basis again and became this release, this almost

kid like recess. It was the time that I could think clearly again and kind of get my wits about me and so started to kind of build that muscle, that practice, uh that routine um into my life again. Mm-hmm. When did you start to see activeware. I mean, like how did you start to think uh that there's a problem with active wear with the stuff I wear and run? Um

That's a problem that needs to be solved. So I was still wearing my Nike as I kinda got back into running. Um if you looked at the Nikes and underarmers of the world they were built on this credo. Harder, better, faster, stronger, and you know, I was wearing kinda shiny bright spandex that

You'd think. the clothing had this connotation of like high performance, high high intensity Yet I was out there moving in it. at a very recreational pace. So There was this personal distonance between what I was wearing

and what I was doing and the feeling I wanted to achieve through what I was doing that That I couldn't reconcile. And so on one of those recreationally paced runs, it dawned on me That there was an opportunity. So kind of

Reframe. activity for for folks that weren't pursuing it to be the fastest. So you felt like Like activeware, right? Like the Nikes and the Lululemons and Those were really m designed for people who were already going to the gym three, four times a week. Or running a few times a week or going to yoga or had a routine, but that

There was no like like did you ever did you ever see the movie Dodgeball? Yes, of course. Yeah, like there was no average Joe's gym, right? There was no wo clothing for average Joe's gym. Right. I wasn't thinking average shows. I was I was really more so thinking The opposite of the competitive athlete.

So There's the Steph Curry's of the world where winning is everything and like there's the me's of the world and and likely a lot more me's of the world that were just needing to find motivation to be active on a daily basis because It was good for me, made me a happier, healthier person.

And that's kind of what I I started to piece together on these runs. I I started to realise that This pressure that surrounded being athletic was not what Would drive. people to be active on a daily basis. And so I started to think through creating

A company or an experience where It was really rooted in in play. So Tyler. It s it sounds to me like you you really started to think about Brand.

Right, I wanna develop a brand that represents X, Y, and Z But that you didn't necessarily have the product that you would sell as part of that brand. Like you hadn't started with, I wanna make clothes, and then I wanna build a a movement around this shirt. It was I wanna build a movement and then I'm gonna figure out what the product is. Correct. It was this feeling that I

was addicted to obsessed with unpacking and and kind of evolving and For me I realized that The future of athletics wasn't about being there first, but about being there most frequently and consistently. And so I wanted to start to think about what drove that consistency. Like what if there's a brand or a path

I mean it's There's a lot of similarities between This and like um Glassier. and what Emily Weiss built because she started with a blog and just writing about

you know, skin care and um self care and it Uh makeup, the cosmetics came later after she already had this s kind of following of people who just loved ordinary women talking about how they take care of their skin. Yeah, I see what you're saying.

It was definitely about building that feeling and brand brand first. And I started to do it just in a simple way before I had any sort of product and I started to bring people together. Inviting friends to go on drugs with me, inviting them to sign up for half marathons with me, which also My intent was to make it fun, and w my intent was to make it you know, that we'd go at a pace that you could still talk and it'd be social and and

It started to to get people together on kind of these these jogs and these informal meetups and and it really did start with community first ahead of product. Mm-hmm. But do do you remember like what But Tipping point was to do apparel. I mean you grew up around apparel. Your your mom and dad and aunt and uncle had this apparel

And You knew how challenging that industry was and So do you remember? What it was where you thought, okay, I mean Was there a conversation you had with somebody or just

Or you just thought this is the way to do it. It's gotta be Athletic wear. I think um These clothes that I had worn, you know, in Through track practice, et cetera.

We're packed with this pressure to be fastest. And so The first place that I recognize there was opportunity to to kind of like tangibly

create something that that could be emotionally packed with this playfulness was with the clothing that I was wearing on these jogs. And so I look down I was still wearing Right, Chinese spandex. And I said, I wanna create an outfit that reflects

the freedom and kind of the playfulness of This feeling that I'm excited about right now. Do you remember like f the first time you went back to your dorm wherever you were living and you started to sketch out What they could look like.

Yeah, it was right out of school. So I think in two thousand twelve, which was when I started to put pen to paper. Um And it's funny looking back'cause the crop top and the two tone legging which are sh some of our best sellers today, are the first two things I sketched. Um I had no idea how to make'em'cause I ha I had not gone to Parsons for fashion. Design by any means.

But A lot of the greatness of going to a school like Persons was You were able to visualize. Your ideas.

And so I was very comfortable in a sketchbook. Um I started sketching out this outfit, this idea of a single outfit. For activity. that was made of technical materials that were comfortable to move in, but didn't have the connotations of competitive athlete. And it was like a it was a top.

And it was Like stretch bands, right? Like that you would run in. Yeah. Yeah, crop top. So Effectively a sports broth. And then And then pants. But what

What was the thing that you were gonna make make different? Was it not gonna feel like How was it gonna be different? So for me it started with the material, so Traditional active wear feels shiny, kinda spandexy, very synthetic. I wanted something with more of a natural hand feel that. could integrate into your daily wardrobe. So something you'd wear with

a cotton sweatshirt or some you know pieces from your closet. And so as soon as I had sketched out this top and bottom And the intent was to always pair those two things together. It became kind of your outfit for doing things, your outfit for being active in a recreational way. I realized that

The material was the most important aspect of Athletic products. So this is the thing, right? Like we've we've had Chipilson on the show who founded Lululemon, but he founded it in his, you know, forties after he had already had a snowboard apparel business. And so he was familiar with different materials and sourcing and, you know, those kinds of things. Um your family had a a small apparel company, but I'm assuming it was mostly just cotton, right? Yeah. You're now talking about the most complex material, right? Like Where do you begin? Where did you even know where to go to find out like w how this stuff is made and and how you could like know which material to use.

Yeah, I mean I I became the goo goo queen. So literally like And people ask me this a lot, but Creating product was not something I studied. I Didn't go to Partions for that. But there's so much you can learn by

By Googling and becoming obsessed with finding solutions to your questions. So I was obsessed with figuring out where the mecha of materials for technical yarns was and and Through Google Found Outdoor Retailer.

And Got myself there. Outdo retailer. Outdoor retailer, which is that is Yeah, that that is

the biggest trade show for technical sports vendors. To come together. So you googling like material, like like your search terms where I mean, I'm just thinking about me because I don't I feel like um high tech sweat wicking material cl you know, enter And eventually you land on the site for Like a trade show that

That happens to be the trade show for Fabric? Yeah, uh e exactly. So Googling for hours and hours and hours and days and days and days to to narrow it down. So Eventually.

recognized that was where all arrows pointed to and and so And so that was held in Utah. Alright, so you find out about this trade show and you what'd you do did you like Register as a buyer or as an attendee or I mean yeah, you pay for it, so figure it out. Whatever the right credentials were.

and asked my dad to come along with me. So From New York flew to Boulder, hopped in a car, we drove to Salt Lake City. Um, we went to outdoor retailer and I went and shook hands and listened to and spoke to probably a hundred plus vendors. So you went y with your dad there and did you go as a business owner or did you like when you s met people, right? Did you say, Hi, I'm Tyler Haney and I'm with Did you have a company or an I or did you I I use the student card. I use the student card for far too long or way too long, perfectly too long. Oh you said I'm a student at Parsons? Yep. And I'm looking into just different material for my designs or like what was your what did you say to people when you met them? Yeah, I I brought my sketchbook.

I my badge said Parsons School of Design and my pitch would be I'm I'm building the next grade activewear brand. And I'm looking for Бест і клас матеріаф. These two products and here are the four criteria that I need. And certainly people would be like, who's this young kid, get out of here. until I found one lovely guy named Stefan and I he took an interest in in kind of

the design and what I was looking for and and really spent time with me helping me understand kind of the nuances of of this material. He was a vendor at the trade show. He was a vendor. And what was he selling? Uh materials. Raw materials. I'm just tr I'm trying to get into this trade show, right? I'm Stefan. I've got a business, and my objective at the trade show is to get as much business as possible to walk away with as many potential leads so then I go back to m to to my office and then We can fulfill orders, right? But then there's this like twenty-two year old kid, right, who's coming up and saying, Hey, can I talk to you I'm trying I'm trying to figure out why. What what do you think

Like what Yeah, why why do you think you did it? It's a great question. Um, I view it as luck. I mean I was persistent as hell. And so

I was going to after I had his contact. not let him not talk to me. Um And I think there must have been something about that persistence that You know, was endearing. So you get back to New York.

And you follow up with this guy Stefan and what did you do? Did you fly out to see him? Did you Have a conversation over the phone and say, Here's what I want, can you make it? So he he had my list of requirements and he started to send me headers. Um headers are kind of from their fabric library.

product or materials that they've developed in the past. that kind of allow you to orient around kind of what you like and don't like from a hand filled perspective. And so using these headers I was able to say Yes, this one has the softness I'm looking for. Or no, this one doesn't have the aesthetic I'm looking for.

And so we sent headers to then fine tune the request that they would then start to develop for me. But I mean, I think it's not a good thing A company that makes fabric, right? And it's gonna make like a bespoke kind of fabric.

For Somebody I'm assuming that they have like a minimum order, like You gotta order, I don't know. ten thousand dollars worth or fifty thousand dollars worth of material before they're they'll even consider doing this.

for you. Yeah. Um so What we ended up doing was finding uh Stefan h he and his team were constantly making new materials to present to the likes of the Nike's and Under Emers and Lulu's. So they had created a material kind of at a similar

time that they ended up showing me Uh and maybe they had shown it just to the other companies, but no one had picked it. And It was a fabric that really checked the boxes for me in terms of what I was looking for. And so I ordered um an initial few rolls to start to make samples out of. So they had this material that was exactly right for you, and you could order it and I'm assuming that you were just using your savings to pay for this probably a couple hundred dollars or thousand dollars or whatever. Yeah, I had I had had different jobs throughout school and so was able to have savings and and use those for those initial samples.

Alright, so they come out to you in New York. By the way, are you out of the dorms at this point? Yeah, I'm living in the East Village and needed place to store bolts of material. They're about six feet tall and and twelve inches wide. Um, and so The only place to store it was in my room. So went to IKEA, got a bunk bed, took the first shelf of the bunk bed out.

Lived on the top bunk bed and my new product studio. was right under that top bunk button shelf and so had my product stored there. Alright, so you have this stuff. You've got your drawings. Get your material.

Now it's time to make something, right? You gotta you gotta make your Prototypes. Yep. So I started calling friends from school. There were a lot of people who had studied fashion and so essentially was starting to interview for designers to simply help me understand how to connect the dots between I've got this, I've got this material, I've got these sketches, I don't know what to do next. And and in 2013, like what were you doing for money?

I had gone in house with one of the fashion companies that I had met through Launch Collective. And so I Um, worked their wall. Parallel path in the

kind of making this product for what would become O V. So you had a full time job as a I guess an assistant to Yeah. I think my title must have been a something assistant, yes. And then on the side at like at night on a weekends you were thinking about this thing.

Figure out. Exactly. So going to Parsons, I knew a lot of design students, so I would start to have them over And a number of Parson students pointed me to

The midtown garment district, there's tons of factories, et cetera. That you wouldn't be aware of until you really start certain. And they're just in those buildings. Yeah, I mean, never knew that world existed. Yeah. And most of them.

Almost all of them only made high end fashion. Product. Wanting to make active wear. So kind of ran into a roadblock there, I'd go in and say, Hey, let's make like can you help me make this? I

No nothing about pattern making, but I I need to make a pattern and then Cut the fabric into this pattern and have it sewn up. Or would you just Would you call and say, Hey, I'm a graduate of Parsons and I I want to meet or would you just ring the doorbells and show up? Guy, I did it all.

I would call, I would show up, I Would Find myself in factories that were Definitely not willing to work with me. Um Most were like, This isn't what we do, can't help you.

But There was one factory called Sunshine, and it was run by these two Asian women who were lovely and for whatever reason said yes to making the patterns for me. And they had warned me that they hadn't worked with this type of material before, but I said, Hey, let's try, let's get a pattern started, I I wanna see what comes back. And and so after Many no's we don't make this type of product. I got a yes from these two women at Sunshine Sunshine Production.

And did you have to like order a bunch of them? They started with the pattern, so I so I needed to take the sketches from my sketchbook and create three D patterns so that you know they'd fit So it was not gonna be like The finished, it was just gonna be but it was gonna be a sports bra and And the pants and the like the the running pants, right? Like the physical w when they were done with it, you would have

You would have that. Yep, the first proto. The first go at the crop top in the running pant. I'm just trying to figure out why they agreed to do this. Just did they like you? Do you think w did they like the product? What What m made them agree to do this for you? Uh I mean I'm quite charming, you know. Uh I I went in, I think I was so clear on exactly what I wanted and I wasn't gonna give up. Um

That Though there were many no's, I I was gonna find a yes. And These manufacturing houses are extremely busy ahead of fashion weeks and then when they do production, but there are off times and so they're trying to fill every hour. Um and so I think they must just have had a gap in in their scheduling and and I was able to slip in. Prototypes to to be made.

When I first went to Sunshine, I had the product, I had the designs, I asked them to make the patterns. They came back and the leggings almost had three legs in them. I it was something had been lost in translation and Um, by no means Did it look like what I thought it would come back looking like? So

It took probably two to three weeks to really sit there up at the at the factory with them and understand what pattern making was and and really kind of translate for them what I wanted in in what seemed like a pretty simple, straightforward running legging and crop top. But two to three weeks later I got my initial Prototypes. And how'd they look?

So they looked beautiful. I put them on and and was gonna be the first person to try them and pretty quickly They weren't stretchy. Like the they had been sewn with a type of machine Where The yarn does not is not Essentially constructing the garment in a way to stretch. So

I go for a run in this new product and seams are popping everywhere. Yeah. And it's very clear to me that this is not the the right recipe. So you gotta go back to the drawing board, I guess. Yes. Mm. So

I call up Stefan, um my material guy and say Stephon, here's where I've been. I've been in Midtown. What a disaster. All the seams are popping. This isn't working. Help help me figure out what's next. And Stefan Has the connections to all of the activeware manufacturers. That was a big unlock for me. Um

And so he said Ty, there's no one who makes active wear on on the east coast. Come to LA. And so I book a ticket to LA. I stay with a friend in Venice.

And I Google Map where I where I end up needing to go. To meet this manufacturer that Stefan connected me with, and it's South El Monte, California, which Is Uh an hour and a half

South. Of where I was in Venice in the middle of nowhere. Alright, so you so you um Bring your sketches again. to this place in El Monte and they agree to

Make you a f a few prototypes again? Yeah, so I still have the paper patterns that were made by the women at Sunshine Factory in New York. I bring the samples that I had run in that had popped seams and said, Hey, help me understand what's wrong here. And Jennifer was her name at the El Monte factory, and she looks at it and says, Ah, you need flatlocks, you mean. This is easy. Um and and so flatlock seeming was essentially what was

going to allow us to sew the leggings and crop tops so that when you move the the seams have enough give that they don't pop and break. And so I I spent a lot of time going back and forth to this El Monte factory. So that I could go back to New York. With the right stitching and enough product to start to get on friends and family. Were you using your own money? Did you have to borrow money from

your parents or or anyone at at this point to to just pay for just the basic Startup costs. This is why I was so adamant about maintaining my job because there was no other way to fund this and

I was purely funding it through through my own savings. Granted it was very small scale. So it wasn't that expensive. I could. It wasn't that expensive. Um Ten samples I think probably cost me a thousand dollars. But it was all money that I was collecting from having a full time job. So they make a prototype. And how does it

Has it come out? Has it turned out? So I started getting in on the friends that I had recruited to start to be part of these little jogger sessions with me. Two close friends, Annie and Ryan. I lived with them. I gave them both uh a kit when I got back from LA and said hey

Take this jogging to the gym, et cetera, give me feedback. And so at a super micro level started product testing. Starting with myself and then and then with like a small extended uh group of friends. And what were they telling you? People loved it. Um And that that was like the fit was right on the material was was really comfortable and and they started wearing it Not only to the gym but for

more of their life and and kind of with their daily clothing. This is twenty thirteen. You've got Some pretty good prototypes. You're getting feedback from people. You're still working full time. At what point do you think all right, I gotta just

Jump into this two feet. Yeah, I was Intent on keeping my job as long as possible. Um, and I think that's something that I'd recommend for people in in the startup space or wanting to create something, hold on to that job as as long as you possibly can.

But Once I started to have product that was really working I then started working on positioning again, like what is this brand, what is this opportunity that's going to Connect.

To the product and be something that I want to go get more people on board with. So how did you settle on the name after our voices? Yeah, I was actually at a bar on Um Rivington in New York with friends.

And kept coming back to This feeling as a little kid and like getting up and being loud and and kept describing this need in in this active wear space to like shake things up and and so I was with friends talking about that kind of like youthful Fearless little kid, and in conversation I think someone said, Do you remember when your mom used to like tell you to use your under voice?

And it really started to click there. I was like After voice that It's about getting loud, it's about boldness, it's youthfulness, it's getting big, it's I I I tell my kids use their library voice. When they're too loud. And so the idea was like this is gonna be your outdoor voice. This is where you can scream and shout and jump and all those things.

Yeah, thinking back to play and recess and and that like unbounded enthusiasm you have as a little kid, like that's what I wanted the brand to evoke. And it came up naturally in conversation and and I think someone else said it and then I grabbed onto it. I loved recess. That was my favorite.

The best. Okay. Um Alright, so how are you going to get

Your Apparel into stores. You've got a good prototype. But you gotta get it in front of customers or potential customers.

Yeah, so I started Googling trade shows again and found a show called Magic, which was in Las Vegas. And Um, this was where all kind of the start up brands would go. to get seen by boutiques and So After that initial run of ten,

I think I paid. Five thousand dollars to get Two hundred units or Two hundred tops and and bottoms made, uh, so that I could show up to this trade show. in Las Vegas and start pitching after voices

the next great activewear brand. This is um I think a pretty famous trade show in Las Vegas, right? It's like a couple times a year and And you went there, you bought like a vendor or like a a a sales Badge or or the tiniest booth possible probably. twelve hundred dollars to rent. Right. Um

And I'm in this little postage stamp. And had Had these samples on the racks and and started meeting people. And lots of people would take a look, not interested.

felt like is this really the place to be? Like this seems It seems like it's not working and then This guy named Ian walked in. And he owned a little tiny fashion boutique, but really impactful fashion I'd find out later. In in in London. In London. It's called Garb Store.

And he comes in and I and says, This is interesting, I love the material, what is it? And I start describing to him, hey This is the next great act of our brand, it's outdoor voices. Come look at the product. I'm doing this, this, and this with it. And He says, Wow, this is awesome. I wanna make an order. Wow. That was your first order.

That was my first order. And how many pieces did he want? I believe it was in the fifties, so it was tiny, but that was the first order and I left um that trade show Magic with A handful of PO, so purchase orders, so intent to buy. those made quickly or did you just were you able to call a factory now, Monty, and say, Hey, I've got these orders and I need to do two hundred.

More. So I pick up the phone I call Jennifer and El Monte say hey we've we've got our first PO's Um Jen makes it happen. Um, I think I I left with seven purchase orders and I ended up fulfilling five. And so financially I was able to make it happen from from Savings.

Couple thousand bucks exactly. Alright, so you get the the stuff made, you send it at these boutiques. And Does anything happen instantly? Yeah, um About

Two weeks after the product arrived at the boutiques I get a call from Jakew. This woman Tracy calls me. She says, Hey, I saw Outdoor Voice as your product at Garb Store in London and I love it. Can we talk? Wow.

And she said, Hey. We have a platform called the Discover program, um we're interested in in talking with you. about bringing after voices onto this program. So Tracy

I go and meet her with her, I bring her the product. And after I meet with her a few weeks later I get a purchase order for eleven thousand units. Wow, that's not gonna cost a couple thousand bucks. Right. That's like you're talking now like hundreds of thousands of dollars maybe. It was five hundred thousand dollars. A five hundred thousand dollar purchase order. Yeah. And was there a deadline did you have to get done like within a certain period of time?

Yeah, it was within I think the the ship date was five months later. And did you think No problem, I'll figure this out in five months and get this made. That's exactly when I realized it was time to quit my job.

When we come back in just a moment. How Tyler scramble to come up with the money. and then make enough kits for J Crew? within five months. Stay with us, I'm Guy Raz, and you're listening to How I Built This from NPR.

Hey, welcome back to How I Built This. I'm Guy Roz. So it's around the beginning of 2014, and Tyler Haney is working on fulfilling that big purchase order from J. Crew. And the immediate problem she needs to solve? Is money, how to come up with the money up front. To make eleven thousand units of the outdoor voices kit?

Um I first went to my my aunt and so NEM I said, I've got this PO, you're familiar with this Are you guys willing to invest? And and they put twenty five K in. They were my they were the first funders, which was awesome. So With that purchase order in hand. And essentially a commitment from J. Crew.

To this five hundred K. It made it. A lot easier, presumably, than without that PO to raise that first twenty five K. So So how much money did you raise from friends and family?

Yeah, I think I raised within Two to two and a half months for hundred K Which was more than I needed to fulfill that. Five hundred K. Order.

And this is like ten thousand here, twenty five there. Maybe fifty. Yep. It was small bites. Where where'd you go?'Cause a lot of people, right, are like, Man, four thousand bucks, how do you raise that money? Like where do you find that money? So

I started um went to people that I had met in New York that I knew had been successful and had expressed intent as kinda they got word that I was working on outdoor voices, so I think there were three friends in New York who ended up putting between ten to twenty thousand dollars in

I started Googling for kind of seed investors and people that I could find online that put initial money into into companies. And there was a guy named

Who I remember um reading a ton about and and so I went to him, knocked on his door and said, Hey This is what I'm doing. Uh would love for you to put twenty five to fifty K in and he did. Well who was he? He was just a investor in New York.

Yeah, he was an entrepreneur and an investor. And you found out about him through just Googling. Wow. Yeah, again back back to just Typing in you know, investors in New York, fashion investors, apparel investors. early stage investors, et cetera. So I think having that that J Crew order was really helpful early on because

I knew that if I could figure out how to get these units produced I have a big check coming back. Um Uh you know, within five months. So they were gonna pay for it. Um and there was no risk that they would like return unused Product and you would just have to eat that.

I'm sure there was. I I at that point wasn't thinking about it. I was like Eleven thousand units, we're gonna get this across the finish line. Got it. Alright, so you get the money. Did that factor in El Monte make those eleven thousand units? They made the eleven thousand units and I was there in LA with them on the last possible ship date. before J Crew could cancel the P. O. So we somehow uh got it all together and were able to to produce right in the nick of time.

Now I remember talking to Sarah Blakely about fulfilling her first order for Nimamarcus of Spanx, and it's actually not so simple because when you're working with a big company like Nevan Marcus, or in your case Jake Crew, There's all these things you have to documents you have to fill and there's specific requirements that you have to meet and and right, this it's a very complex process. You don't just put stuff in a box and ship it to J Crew, right? Right. Yeah. The way it needs to be tagged, uh there's a whole system and and kinda way of doing things. So

worked very closely with Tracy Hru to really understand what what was needed. Um and I forgot to mention this, but I knew I needed to be in LA'cause I wasn't gonna run the risk of production going off the track. I rented out my um apartment in New York, um or my room, my bunk room. found a couch to rent in Venice and ended up living with these lovely folks that I found on Craigslist and would drive every single day from

Venice to El Monte and Venice to El Monte. making sure that every one of these eleven thousand units was going to be in perfect tip top shape when they got to J Crew. So when they got to J. Crew, were they promoting the product? Like, was it totally different from everything else they were selling? Like how were how was it gonna be visible? Yeah, this was five

Plus years ago and it was really When this activeware space was starting to take off. Yeah. Yes, blowing up. And so a J Crew had had a lot of success with this discover program where they brought new brands, you know, to their Customer and so

put me on the Discover program. They did a a shoot, um with me actually in Central Park in the product And then described the product and and launched it. So it it it launches a J Crew and What happened, how had it do? Mm. did phenomenally. And so I think within the first week they had already sold through fifty percent of of the product. Um

At that moment I was really thankful for the opportunity to to get a lot of eyeballs on on the brand, but I knew Okay, now is the time. to click it into gear and and start building this thing. Um And that was two thousand fourteen.

I started putting together a list of Larger investors that I you know, had red would fund early stage companies, et cetera. I worked with a friend of mine that worked in finance to really start to put a business model together. Um

And This deck that I would then go pitch investors in New York with. All right, so you've got to raise money, right, to really Yeah.

Where did you go? Where did did you just start Cold emailing. Potential investors. Yeah, I created a list of twenty five. V Cs um like where? Like through Reading and Tech Grunch and

through asking people and and people who would raise money, et cetera. So I started emailing um I still had my my student E D U address, which was quite funny. it somehow hadn't gotten shut off. And so I for a number of these folks I started emailing them from

My Parsons. and saying, Hey, I'd love to pitch you on my new idea, um, outdoor voices, da da da da but I really leaned on the student card to get in into these folks' offices. And You think using your student Address. Helped.

It definitely helped. It got me into these initial meetings. The initial meetings weren't where I got funded. But These initial meetings were hugely important as as kind of practice routines to really refine my pitch. I'd show up with the product, I'd show up with the deck and and for the first time ever go pitch on this idea I had coming out of Parsons as a graduate.

Do you remember roughly what percentage of those twenty five got back to you? Said sure, come by. Of the twenty five. Let's see, I would say probably nineteen got back to me. Wow. Which was crazy. Yeah. And and out of those nineteen, when you start to go meet with them, did any of them say, This is awesome. I'm in I want to actually give you money.

Oh no, every single one of those first meetings were like Thank you, love this, thanks for love that you had the courage to get in here, but you need some there this needs work. I mean I had never done this before and I knew that by getting into the room of of some of these folks I would learn a lot. And

I had at that time this idea of just begin, just begin, just begin. So I began. A and what specifically were these investors saying? Like w were getting feedback like you gotta do more of this or not enough of this or or this isn't right. Yeah, I mean

Pretty consistently the first probably Five conversations. I Yeah. But we have Under Armour and we have Nike. Like why do we need another activewear brand? Which is a fair question. There's Lululemon, like Athleisure w is so saturated, right? I mean

Two thousand fourteen, that's probably what people were saying. Yeah, exactly. And and What I started to piece together was I was In offices with Men and

These traditional active where brands had been built by men and really catered to men. So this Credo in this positioning around the competitive athlete, the harder, better, faster, stronger.

Familiar. Two The folks that I was pitching. And so what I started to recognize was that Me over here pitching this

active wear brand around play and freeing fitness from performance. Didn't make sense. To these folks that had grown up as competitive athletes. And what what was the breakthrough? How did you finally get somebody to say, Yep, I'll give you some money? Yeah, I started to realize that Going into these offices with

um, mostly males and having conversations with them was not going to get me there. So Ahead of going into a number of these meetings I would start sending product to the women in the offices and the wives of some of these investors. It it did happen to be only male investors, so I started to find that by getting product, getting the product, the kit, onto the women in the offices and the wives, I started to get people that were willing to spend more time and hear me out and understand, Ah, wait, this could be something. This I I'm starting to picture this. This could be something real. I started to get more time with folks.

And Who was the person Who said? Alright. I'll give you some money.

Who was the first one? Yeah, Peter Boyce from General Catalyst. Um General catalyst is Big VC, you're probably familiar with him out of Boston. He saw the product, saw the pitch, had gotten product on his girlfriend Natalia. She loved it and he said I love this concept I I wanna back it and and they were the first people to lead our seed round. And then with that, you know, once you started to

Raise some and how much did you raise in that first round, do you remember? Um One point one million dollars. Wow. Okay, so you got one point one million sounds like a lot of money, but Making clothing and building a team. That's really expensive. At this point, was it still just you or did you have somebody with you?

I had hired two two additional team members. One to really focus on sales and then one to focus on customer experience. So At this time, two thousand fourteen, we started um We launched Doctor Voices dot com. A scrappy website, but a place that as these J Crew customers started to learn about us, we hoped would start to visit after voices and wanted something to exist to sell more product. And so

Used the seed round money to hire an additional three folks. Um open an office,'cause we had been working out of my apartment um in the East Village, and then to make more product. And is Jay Crew still selling your stuff at this point? Uh in twenty fifteen, yes. Yeah. It again it was

A really great way to you know, get a lot eleven thousand people quickly to know about us, but After Uh that initial buy with J Crew. We decided hey, we wanna own this directly.

we want to start building outdoor voices as a direct to consumer brand. Alright, so with that money Like how do you start thinking about how to Get this brand out into the world beyond J Crew. Back to when I was initially starting the product I had

always brought these groups of people together to do an activity. And at this stage. I started realizing that this offline kind of gathering of community was really the best way to drive word of mouth.

And so we hosted our first dog jog in in New York. And I had sent out an invite. Outdoor voices invites you to their first dog dog. Just to everybody you knew, every email address you had? Every email address we had, and I expected maybe fifty people to show up and and it ended up being closer to probably two hundred. Uh that showed up with their dogs. And that's when I I really started to realize that

People were resonating with the little bits of the brand and the little bits of the product that were starting to get out into the world. So we started posting content of these little informal groups getting to together for different activities and hashtaging Doing Things. Doing things had become The outdoor voice is mantra. Any sort of activity. through this outdoor voices group.

was hashtag doing things. So with that$1.1 million, were you able to actually open a store? Yeah, so we opened our first store in Austin, Texas, which I had been dating someone in Austin while I lived in New York and Visited Austin for the first time.

f straight from the airport when I landed in Austin went to a spot called Barton Springs, which Uh it's essentially a football field sized spring fed pool at the downtown center of Austin. Yeah. Um Got out of the water, looked up and said This is such a recreational town. This feels like the spiritual or long-term home for outdoor voices.

And so We opened our first store in Austin. and had found this house, uh eight hundred square foot house with a lawn next to it. And said this is Perfect. So we spent a hundred and fifty thousand dollars um to build out our first store in Austin, Texas.

Alright, so you've got the sh the store in Austin. But a million Dollars is not gonna be enough runway. You've gotta pay the rent, you've gotta pay your people, you've gotta make clothing. So I have to assume that you had to

Go right back to it. Really start to raise more money. Yeah, so with that round of funding, um At that point we had from an awareness standpoint Relying on

The J Crew units um and new customers driven from that. As well as word of mouth. I then reached out to a friend from Parsons. Actually, we hadn't known each other, she became a friend later on, but Leandra Medine, who had this blog called The Man Repeller. Has this blog called The Man Repeller. And asked her to do a collaboration. And the man repeller, uh this is a blog, like if just for people who don't know it, it's like a

It's like kind of a a crooky. Fashion block, right? Yep. And I essentially wanted to Take

Leandra and work with her to create a customized kit. So Same top and bottom, but influenced by her personality and So Launched the man repeller kit. The kit came with

A bag that had on the outside printed in it for the smoothie and had like a little popsicle. Keycha, um And like a vintage Jump rope and I thought she was so perfect to as our first kind of collaborative partner to

to really bring kind of the humor and the fun to the activeware space in and be a really good illustration of of kind of what we meant by activity for the fun of it. And Pretty quickly. After that launched.

Got a post in from Lena Dunham in this kit, the the man repeller kit. And she had been Running for the first time on the set of girls, something for the episode. And on Instagram she had a caption that said I've never been a runner.

But I'm I'm learning to run for the first time. And this Kit makes me feel powerful, swift, and strong. This is in like twenty fifteen. This is in twenty fifteen. And that's like wow Girls is like one of the hottest shows on T V

She's a massive celebrity. She was I guess read this blog, or she was like a reader of the blog and that's how she she got the kit. Yeah, she was a fan of Leandra and Man Repeller and um Got the kit, and It and wore it for that episode of

And posted about her experience of running for the first time. That was a really meaningful first moment in the sense that Lena wasn't the first person you think of as the you know, someone that an activewear brand is gonna partner with. Um And this was at the time where The athlete was

such a kind of one note look. They were like sinewy with muscles, et cetera. And Lena comes blasting into into our world wearing the kit with curves and never having run. And it was a perfect example of what we meant by This daily exercise or this positioning that we knew there was really opportunity to build the next great brand around. So now at this point, right, series A, you raised a m one point one million dollars

You're at your series A, Lena Dunham's warned your stuff, like um you're getting some traction, you got a shop in Austin, there's buzz, like and I think you raised like seven and a half million dollars in that series A. Yeah. Was was that a lot easier to raise that money than than it was to raise seed money. Yeah, the seed money I I ended up probably meeting fifty people so that that initial list of twenty five kept growing and growing and growing, but actually having traction and a meaningful amount of traction in a short amount of time made it a lot easier to go back to that that group, that General Catalyst and put put this funding together. I'm I'm curious, Tyler, I mean why Wooden.

A Nike or or Lululemon. They could have Kinda Crowded you out of the marketplace. while you were more vulnerable without a a real brand.

Why do you think that didn't happen? I I mean I think Our brand is remote and so

The combination of the activities that we host and the product that people wear while they're engaging in those activities is is the magic, and that's I view my role as essentially kind of the new generation of Jane Fonda as somebody that Brand really helping to inspire and educate and get the world moving. It's a hard combination or recipe for somebody to duplicate. Alright, so you in twenty sixteen

Um you've gone through series B, you raise another thirteen million, you decide formally to move to Austin. Tyler, how did you feel about being the CEO. I mean I think you were like. Twenty six, twenty seven, may maybe twenty six. I mean

You were managing and running a business and certainly had people working for you who were like A lot older. It takes some getting used to. I mean being the CEO

has been very natural given the vision is super clear for me. I think uh in growing this company and and at a speedy pace and with a lot of Capital around the table and a lot of strong voices. We've been lucky. Engagement around the brand to have Mickey Drexler.

From J. Crew actually joined as the chairman of the board. In two thousand sixteen. And Mickey Drexler it was for people don't know, he's like this legendary guy in the industry. He turned gap around and He founded Madewell. He how did you get on his radar at all? Yeah, he so he had heard about us when we initially collaborated with J Crew And I think have been super lucky to have a lot of engaged louder industry voices

around the table but have have had to figure out How to selectively Take you know, experienced advice. And

Know how to channel it. In addition to what I believe and um, understand that to create a company today is meaningfully different than creating a company thirty years ago and and there are differences there.

I mean you've raised I think close to sixty million dollars total Mickey Drexler is the chairman of the board, you've got a board, you've got all these investors. As you had and have had more experienced people coming in, particularly men. Have you ever felt like Hate.

You know, like your man's playing this to me, you know? Like Back off'cause I know what I wanna do. Have you ever had to have that kind of confrontation? I wouldn't say it's it's gender specific, but I think one thing that is super clear to me is the the way we've built the outdoor voices.

to date is untraditional and it's our own playbook. So I very much believe in creating the our own rules to the game and that's what's driven, you know, the success to date. And so What has become Challenging over the last few years is hiring kind of more experience and leadership sometimes comes with folks that Wanna bring playbooks from other companies.

But at the end of the day. taking control and tempering some of the input. has been something that I've learned over time. Um To be

A CEO you have to learn how to take control and not necessarily listen to All the voices around the table. You guys have how many shops now? We have nine stores. And how many employees?

We have three hundred and fifty employees. And through all this you also like met somebody um new in Austin, I'cause I guess you the person that you we're saying you guys split up but you met Somebody knew you got married and you are Gonna be a mom.

I am. and I'm I'm having a baby in mid November. Um First time doing it. Trying a lot of things. Um But being pregnant, the As the CEO of

outdoor voices has been an extreme sport, I think. I've been really focused on With some of my peers like Whitney from Bumble and Audrey from The Wing Showing that There don't have to be like sacrifices from a family

perspective that you take to be the CEO of of fast growing company and you can do it all all kind of in harmony. You know, when I think about your story it You can read it one way, like it was just You were determined and you went from success to success to success and

Here you are. But I wonder like what Was there a dark moment? Was there a moment on this journey Starting at our voices where You had serious doubts or you felt

Really bad about about Anything. I think every day you you kind of uh run the gamut of emotions based on kind of what's happening with the business and with the team, et cetera. And something

But I've been really kind of vocal about without their voices and and I think resonates Personally is We're not up of against the Nikes or under armors of the world.

As a company we're up against people's negative perceptions of themselves, and I think The the most difficult thing about being a CEO for the first time. Sometimes you wake up and you're You know, there's negative

perception of your ability to get done and to to really know what's Right, go forward. And so I've really focused, um kind of through this experience on surrounding myself with The right people to help

continue to to drive the confidence in in my ability to do this and to grow the company and surround myself with smarter and smarter people that That really make this a strong, strong team for the long run. How much of of your of this story do you think is because of luck, and how much do you think it's because you just worked really hard and you're really smart? I think it's persistence, so I think this deep rooted knowledge that you know you're never gonna give up. and you're gonna find a way and there's no other option. Um it's something that that

just has connected all these dots for me. Um People have to believe that you're gonna do it and you're not gonna stop at anything, um, getting in the way. And so This crazy amount of persistence is really what's gotten me to to kind of where I'm at. That's Tyler Haney, founder and CEO of

Outdoors. By the way, as you may have caught towards the end of our interview, Tyler and her husband Mark are expecting a baby girl s sometime around now, so. By the time this podcast hits your feed, It is very likely Tyler will be a new mom.

And please do stick around because in just a moment we're gonna hear from you about the things you're building. Hey, thanks for sticking around because it's time now for how you built that. And this week's story starts when Beth Finbo and a group of new moms took their babies Out for lunch. We had a small corner table in the pizzeria. And they started immediately reaching for like the salt and pepper shakers and the coffee creamer and sugar. Because well

They're babies. They think they're funny and they and they know they're cute. You know, when they drop something and they get the attention of the moms, then they're gonna keep doing that thing. Anyone who's been to a restaurant with a baby knows this game. You have to move all the choking hazards out of their reach, and then when you give them their actual toys The usually just Drop them. And then I thought, well let me go online and see what exists. There must be something. That we can buy that just keeps them busy and makes it easier to take a baby out to eat. But Beth couldn't find anything quite right.

She wanted some kind of placemat that kept the toys secure. the food from spilling and could fit in a diaper bag. So she decided to make her own. I use these silicone mats from Amazon that are actually designed for your pet's food and water bowls. A carabonier I don't know how to say that word ever, but a clip that you just clip on. And then I use fishing tethers, there's these little tethers that you can use to clip your pliers to your belt. Beth took her homemade placemat and she stuck it in front of her son, Christian. And he loved it. But she wasn't sure if other babies would as well. So she did a little market research in the aisles of Target. I would see women at Target with babies and I would say, excuse me for just a second, can I ask you a quick question? And I'd say, I have this idea, I'm inventing a product and

I would say a hundred percent of the feedback was Oh my gosh, that's genius. Yes, I would buy that. Inspired by that feedback? Beth decided to see if she could make something good enough. To sell.

I got my prototype as far as I could on my own. And like I said, I was very rudimentary. Um and I knew I had a great product concept. But I didn't know where to go from there. So Beth started looking for someone who could help take her mat concept to the next level. She found a designer in Salt Lake City in early 2018, and a few months later, she received a revamped design. in the mail. And I don't think I've ever had more emotions in my life than when I

grabbed that envelope and took it in the house to to open it up and try it out. I open the package, I pull it out, I take off the plastic wrapping and I set it on my countertop. And I couldn't pick it up. It instantly stuck. Before I even pressed down on the suction cups or anything, it was stuck there. And I thought, this is awesome. It was exactly the product Beth had dream of. But now she had to figure out how to find the money to make more. My stepdad gave me a a loan and

I used my savings and I sold a car. and scrounge together the money to do the first production run. Beth also launched a Kickstarter campaign to drum up interest. She actually didn't end up meeting her goal of forty five thousand dollars, but she says that was a blessing in disguise. I couldn't have done it. I just couldn't have done it. I didn't know how much goes into manufacturing and production and all the costs involved with making molds and and the timelines. I I would have I would have Probably sunk. But

But she didn't. And since last year, Beth has sold almost 2300 busy baby mats, which translates into around$60,000 in sales. And as for her two year old son Christian Definitely her biggest spokesman. People will often approach us and say, Oh my god, that's so cool, where did you get it? And he'll look up and say, That's my mommy's busy baby mat. That's Beth Finbo. Her product is the Busy Baby Matt, and if you want to find out more or hear previous episodes, head to our podcast page, how I builtthis.npr.org, and of course, if you want to tell us your story, go to build.npr.org.

And thanks so much for listening to the show this week. You can subscribe at Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. And while you're there, please do give us a review. You can also write to us at hibtnpr.org, and if you want to send a tweet, it's at how I built this or at guy. Our show was produced this week by Casey Herman with music composed by Ramteen Areblui. Thanks also to Candace Lim, Julia Carney, San Azmehanpur, Neva Grant, and Jeff Rogers. Our intern is Sequoia Carillo.

I'm Guy Roz, and you've been listening to How I Built

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